Glossary - D

4 A B C E F G H I K L M N O P R S T U V W X 

Date Range:  A CMD.EXE feature which allows you to select files based on 
the date and time they were last modified. 

Date Stamp:  Information stored in a file's directory entry to show the 
dates on which the file was created, last modified, and last accessed. 
 Creation and last access dates are not available in the FAT file system. 
 See also Time Stamp. 

Default Directory:  See Current Directory 

Default Drive:  See Current Drive. 

Delete Tracking:  An operating system or utility software feature which is 
designed to allow you to "undelete" or recover files which have recently 
been deleted.  Delete tracking typically works by temporarily retaining 
the deleted files and/or information about the deleted files in a special 
area of the disk. 

Description:  A string of characters assigned to describe a file with the 
CMD.EXE DESCRIBE command. 

Destination:  In file processing commands (e.g. COPY or MOVE), the name or 
directory files should have after any copying or modification has taken 
place, generally the last specification on the command line.  See also 
Source. 

Detached Process:  A program which is "detached" from the normal means of 
user input and output, and cannot use the keyboard, mouse, or video 
display. 

Device Driver:  A program which allows the operating system to communicate 
with a device, and which is loaded into memory when the system boots. 
 Device drivers are also used to manage memory or for other similar 
internal functions. 

Device:  A physical device for input or output such as the console, a 
communications port, or a printer.  Sometimes "device" is used to refer to 
character devices, and excludes block devices. 

Directive:  An individual item in the CMD.INI file, used to control the 
configuration of CMD.EXE. 

Directory:  A portion of any disk, identified by a name and a relationship 
to other directories in a "tree" structure, with the tree starting at the 
root directory.  A directory separates files on the disk into logical 
groups, but does not represent a physical division of the data on the 
disk. 

Directory History:  A CMD.EXE feature which allows you to recall 
recently-used directory names in a popup window, and choose one to switch 
to. 

Directory History Window:  See Directory History. 

Directory Stack:  A CMD.EXE feature, implemented through the PUSHD and 
POPD commands, which allows you to save the current directory and return 
to it later.  See also Stack. 

Directory Tree:  The branching structure of directories on a hard disk, 
starting at the root directory.  The root of the tree is usually 
considered as the "top" of the structure, so the actual structure can be 
visualized as an upside-down tree with the root at the top and branches 
going "down".  A portion or branch of the directory tree is sometimes 
called a "subtree". 

DOS Memory:  See Base Memory. 

DOS Session:  See Session. 

DPMI or DOS Protected Mode Interface:  A specification which allows DOS 
programs to access memory beyond 1 MB in order to manage larger programs 
or larger amounts of information than will fit in base memory.  DPMI 
support for DOS programs is provided by some DOS memory managers, and by 
OS/2, Windows 3.1 and above, Windows 95, and Windows NT. 

Drive Letter:  A letter used to designate a specific local disk volume, or 
part or all of a network server drive.  In most cases drive letters range 
from A - Z, but some network operating systems allow the use of certain 
punctuation characters as drive letters in order to support more than 26 
volumes.